Unit Description

Summary: This unit provides an overview of lizard biology culminating in the "Life as a Lizard" role playing game. The game gives students a chance to move around indoors or outdoors, and use their movement to learn about lizards and their behavior. Participants take on the identities of lizards and act out a day and night in the life of many different species of lizard. There are no winners or losers, only the successful completion of a day and night as a lizard. The game's props are easily made and the unit contains step by step lessons, glossary words, background information, internet and multimedia resources, trivia activities, and suggestions for math extensions and additonal student investigations.

For information about grade level, education standards, time frame and more please see the following section.

Learning Resource Information

ToL Learner Level: Beginner; Intermediate

Student Grade Level: Grades 3 through 12. Not all the information is appropriate for every audience and lessons should be adapted and/or included according to teacher and student preference.

Time frame: This unit can take from two to three class periods of ~45 minutes or it can be spread out over two weeks with ~ 45 minutes of time spent daily.

Lesson Plans, Activities and More

Follow the links below to access lesson plans and activities. Materials listed for these lessons are available in the "ToL Learning Materials" section of each page. Not every part of the unit needs to be completed, feel free to modify the timeline, omit or add pieces as you see fit. Items marked with an *asterisk are deemed necessary for playing the life as a lizard game. You can add additional learning resources to the unit by registering as a treehouse builder.

Treehouses are authored by students, teachers, science enthusiasts, or professional scientists. Anyone can sign up as a treehouse contributor and share their knowledge and enthusiasm about organisms. Treehouse contributions are checked for general accuracy and quality by teachers and ToL editors, but they are not usually reviewed by expert scientists. If you spot an error, please get in touch with the author or the teacher. For more information about quality control of Tree of Life content, see Status of Tree of Life Pages.

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